5 Gallon Tank New Tank Diary & Planning

[ETNsilverstar]

So I've been planning on a nano tank for a while, so I thought it would be fun to document the process as I get stuff and put it together since I've seen lots of other members do the same. I've been planning on starting a tank for RCS, but I wanted to do some kind of small fish with it as well. My stocking plans are:

A small school of micro-rasbora (probably strawberry rasbora)
10-15 RCS

I'll use a mix of black and white sand for substrate--probably a literal mix with whatever balance looks good--and add a bunch of plants. I don't have exact plants picked out yet, but the tank will be low-tech. I know for sure I want some moss and something that carpets as well as some low-light plants with pretty colors. Possibly a water lily of some kind. There will also be floating plants that will go to the goldfish tank as they grow, since he'll happily eat the extras.

I want to get the tank scaped and running for a bit before adding any fish. Then I'll add the rasboras and wait a while before adding the RCS so the tank can age a little.

I'm having a hard time deciding what tank to get though. Money isn't an issue, but I'm still torn between the cheaper route or the fancy, less-familiar route. I've been looking at:

The 5 gallon petsmart kit
Fluval Edge 6 gallon
Fluval Spec V White 5 gallon

There seem to be mixed thoughts on the ease of having shrimp in a fluval spec, and I can't figure out exactly how the fluval edge works as far as filtration. But the petsmart one is a basic tank with a HOB, so I already know good ways to customize it and make it shrimp safe. I'm leaning toward that one because I can go down the road and buy it any time I want as well. Which would you pick?

I'll update on here as things progress!

 

[AJE]

I would do the 6g

 

[Fish0n]

I can't help you narrow it down as I am trying to make a similar decision w/out the shrimp. I also have the Fluval Flex 9 gallon on my list just because slightly bigger = more space for plants.

 

[ETNsilverstar]

It begins! Not exactly as planned, but it's the beginning and will be housing ghost shrimp for now. I was at petsmart getting cat food yesterday, so of course I had to say hI to the fishies...and I saw they had a bunch of GIANT ghost shrimp! And a bunch were berried!! So I went shopping today. Got a tank, sand, a decoration, and some plants.

So the tank currently has:
5 dwarf hair grass
4 anacharis stems
Some floating java most till I get stuff to put it on
1 marimo moss ball

I pulled the anacharis and java moss from my 10g, and pulled the pre-filter sponge and some filter media as well. The shrimp are being acclimated now. There's 9 total, and EIGHT of them are berried. One is cloudy though, so I'm thinking about keeping it to the side until it has babies, then they'll get added to the tank and mom will go to the goldfish tank. Eventually they will all move to the 10g, but I wanted a chance for the babies to survive instead of being eaten. Goldfish just needs to get its new tank first, and now I think it'll be a little while before I get the okay for that...lol

 

[ETNsilverstar]

I have babies!! They're hard to see, but two are floating and 3 are on the heater. So 5 total so far. I didn't see any moms without eggs, so I'm thinking one just started releasing them. That was fast, so I bought them just in time!

 

[AJE]

Nice

 

[ETNsilverstar]

So when I turned the lights on this morning, I counted AT LEAST a dozen shrimp babies!! They were different sizes too, so I think there were a bunch born last night. I'm still only finding one shrimp without eggs though, so mom #2 might not have released them all yet. I didn't get a super good look though.

And on a side note, the white shrimp was dead this morning. It was still carrying its eggs and they seemed pretty dark, so I don't think they got fertilized.

 

[AJE]

So when I turned the lights on this morning, I counted AT LEAST a dozen shrimp babies!! They were different sizes too, so I think there were a bunch born last night. I'm still only finding one shrimp without eggs though, so mom #2 might not have released them all yet. I didn't get a super good look though.

And on a side note, the white shrimp was dead this morning. It was still carrying its eggs and they seemed pretty dark, so I don't think they got fertilized.

I they are under her tail they are fertilized, you can still save them

 

[Guanchy]

congrats!!! That's exciting.

I have a thriving 10 gallon nano tank full of RCS, I have tried to keep ghost shrimps for a few years and I have had no success! They won't last more than a week! lol idk what it is. so Congratulations to you! nice tank btw

 

[AJE]

I too have tons of shrimp babies

 

[Guanchy]

I too have tons of shrimp babies

ghost??

 

[AJE]

ghost??

No rcs, I was agreeing with you about the rcs

 

[ETNsilverstar]

I they are under her tail they are fertilized, you can still save them

If I had time, I would have done more investigating to see if they could be saved, but I had to go to an appointment this morning and couldn't do anything. There's 7 other pregnant shrimp though, so I'm not worried.

congrats!!! That's exciting.

I have a thriving 10 gallon nano tank full of RCS, I have tried to keep ghost shrimps for a few years and I have had no success! They won't last more than a week! lol idk what it is. so Congratulations to you! nice tank btw

Thanks!! The tank will be RCS eventually, but the ghost shrimp in my other tank never even got berried. Not sure if I had all males or if they weren't old enough or what, but they've all disappeared now. I got lucky to find these ones already berried!

 

[Guanchy]

No rcs, I was agreeing with you about the rcs

ohhh ok, I thought you meant, that you have tons of ghost shrimp babies.

Thanks!! The tank will be RCS eventually, but the ghost shrimp in my other tank never even got berried. Not sure if I had all males or if they weren't old enough or what, but they've all disappeared now. I got lucky to find these ones already berried!

and that's awesome! Ghost shrimps are really cool

 

[ETNsilverstar]

and that's awesome! Ghost shrimps are really cool

Yeah, I actually got hooked on them many years ago when I first saw ghost shrimp at petsmart. But I couldn't have a tank then and now I can!! Mwahaha

 

[ETNsilverstar]

These little guys sure like giving me heart attacks!! As of yesterday it seems all shrimp have finally released their babies, but when I turn on the lights in the morning I only see a couple. But then at night I find tons of them out and about! The highest I counted was 30 babies, but I counted 24 last night. Some are even properly sitting on stuff in the tank like adult shrimp and it's so cute!! I need to try and take a good picture of them all floating around tonight...

 

[AJE]

These little guys sure like giving me heart attacks!! As of yesterday it seems all shrimp have finally released their babies, but when I turn on the lights in the morning I only see a couple. But then at night I find tons of them out and about! The highest I counted was 30 babies, but I counted 24 last night. Some are even properly sitting on stuff in the tank like adult shrimp and it's so cute!! I need to try and take a good picture of them all floating around tonight...

Nice

 

[ETNsilverstar]

One of the shrimp has eggs again! After doing some reading, it seems like that must mean that my tiny shrimp is a male and sexually mature. Yay! So hopefully the others will get berried again soon too. I added some driftwood and more plants, so I'm not seeing the babies much anymore. Also added a single MTS that was a stowaway in the java moss I bought.

 

[ETNsilverstar]

I need to take a picture, but I'm down to 4 adult shrimp in the tank. One died and got eaten while I was gone over a weekend, and I pulled 3 out on Sunday to go to QT because they were cloudy. One of the three was dead when I got home last night, so I only have 2 in QT. I also had 2 with eggs, but neither of them have eggs now. Hopefully they'll get berried again at some point.

BUT...I have officially seen 5 of the babies out and about all at once, so I think quite a few have survived. Only time will tell. I haven't seen any for weeks, so they've been hiding very well. They're so cute!

I've also added a bunch of plants and driftwood to the tank. There's a dwarf lily bulb that has gone crazy! One of the stalks grew probably 4 inches yesterday! I replaced the light over the weekend, so I think that helped.

Oh, and I think I saw a copepod the other day too! I tried to get a picture so I could get a confirmation, but I couldn't get my camera to focus on it.

And today is officially 1 month that the tank has been up and running! So yay!

 

[ETNsilverstar]

Got some shrimpy pics this morning. Couldn't find any babies, but these guys were posing so nice!

 

[ETNsilverstar]

Added new inhabitants tonight! We were in the town over for a birthday party and stopped into the LFS there because my bf was hoping for RCS. They were out, but happened to have mosquito rasbora in the tank next to it...so here they are! They're even schooling already!

 

[ETNsilverstar]

Small update:

Got my order last week from aquatic arts, which was 6 more of the rasbora (got 7), and 10 RCS (sent 13, but one died in transit, so 12 went into the tank). I also got some blue and pink ramshorn snails. It's making for a LOT of red in the tank and it's so pretty!

I found 2 dead RCS a couple days later. One was whole and the other was...a tiny piece. It looks like the ghost shrimp were snacking on it, because one had a SUPER red stomach. I reconfirmed that all three were ghost shrimp, but moved them into the goldfish tank in case they were bullying the RCS. The ghost babies are still in with the RCS and will get moved when they get bigger. Since I have a tank in the basement now, they may go in there if the cloudy ghosts die by the time they're ready to move. Only time will tell.

It looked like 2 of the RCS were berried when I added them to the tank too. They're quite good at hiding though, so I'm not sure if the eggs survived acclimation or if they got dropped.

The tank is also almost completely clear of brown algae too! The shrimp and snails really went to town on it. Now I just have to wait out RCS having babies...I feel like it's gonna take forever!

 

[ETNsilverstar]

Took some pictures of everyone the other day. Schooling rasboras and food time! I also saw a couple snails mating (at least that's what it looked like) then found some eggs shortly after. So hopefully there will be some baby snails in a couple weeks!

 

[FishMommer]

Nice! Love the red snails?!

 

[ETNsilverstar]

Since I had so many casualties, I ordered some more RCS from a fishlore member and added them to the tank on Friday. They acclimated well and there hasn't been a single casualty since! I've seen a couple saddled shrimp too, so hopefully they will be berried soon and start having babies. There's also lots of snail babies, but they're still really hard to see.

 

[AJE]

Since I had so many casualties, I ordered some more RCS from a fishlore member and added them to the tank on Friday. They acclimated well and there hasn't been a single casualty since! I've seen a couple saddled shrimp too, so hopefully they will be berried soon and start having babies. There's also lots of snail babies, but they're still really hard to see.

Cool! Any pictures?

 

[ETNsilverstar]

Cool! Any pictures?

Not yet for the new RCS or snail babies. I still need to take some of the RCS and the snails are too tiny for my camera right now. lol

 

[ETNsilverstar]

As of today there are FOUR berried shrimp! One has been berried about 2 weeks now, one for 1 week, and the other two just popped up in the last couple of days. I've been trying to get pics, but the only are in a good spot for pics when I don't have my phone with me to take any! lol

 

[AJE]

As of today there are FOUR berried shrimp! One has been berried about 2 weeks now, one for 1 week, and the other two just popped up in the last couple of days. I've been trying to get pics, but the only are in a good spot for pics when I don't have my phone with me to take any! lol

Cool!